Articles for tag: Letter from the Publisher

May 1, 2023

Jerry Harris

The Need for Unity

By Jerry Harris  Unity is central to the biblical message. Something special rises up when people from different circles get to know each other by learning, sharing, playing, and worshiping together. Sociologists call it “emergence.” It’s when a group becomes more than the sum of its parts. The Holy Spirit works in that unity, that oneness.   We are called to be one. The church is the hope of the world, and we can do far more together than we can apart. God has repeatedly shown us how unity can empower us to accomplish things that seemingly are impossible for individuals.

May 1, 2022

Jerry Harris

Jerry Harris

Transitions Are Great Times to Innovate

By Jerry Harris I’m tired of several culturally popular words. The term “new normal,” which I’ve written about previously, is one of them; it seems to carry a connotation of something “less than before” that we must reluctantly accept. I’m also tired of the overuse of the word “season”—it causes me to have “friends are friends forever” flashbacks! But the one I’m seeing more and more lately is the word “transition.” That hits close to home, as I have just “transitioned” from being senior pastor of The Crossing—a position I’d held for the last 24 years—to teaching pastor; the person

November 1, 2021

Jerry Harris

The Greatest Love Song of All Time

By Jerry Harris What is the greatest love song of all time? Ask 10 people and you’ll probably get 10 different answers. It’s said music is the language of emotion, and if true, then singing is its spoken word. Our emotions come directly from being made in God’s image because our God is an emotional God—a God who feels. Our God not only feels emotions, but he also invented them . . . and some of the best emotions are called the fruit of the Spirit. That list in Galatians 5 begins with the greatest and highest of all emotions:

March 15, 2020

Jerry Harris

Hope in the Dark

By Jerry Harris Were you scared of the dark when you were a kid? There are two reasons we naturally fear darkness: Darkness makes us see things that aren’t really there. Darkness keeps us from seeing things that actually are there. I remember seeing scary shadows in my room at night when I was little. I needed to have a night-light on or leave my bedroom door slightly open. But the closet—that needed to be closed.  I feared the darkness of the closet . . . and the darkness under the bed. I remember imagining things were coming to life

January 29, 2020

Jerry Harris

Healing the Brokenhearted

By Jerry Harris He was absolutely convinced he was doing the right thing. His indoctrination into the rightness of his position came about over many years; it was painstakingly produced through study and a network of key relationships. His animosity toward this new sect was fueled by an urgency to stamp it out quickly, before it irreparably damaged the true faith forged in a 1,500-year fire of trial and adversity. Followers of this cult didn’t deserve mercy, pity, or the benefit of due process; they didn’t deserve even a second thought because of their perversion of all things good and

December 31, 2019

Jerry Harris

The Rules Have Changed

By Jerry Harris The January issue of Christian Standard focuses on the business side of church. Leaders make decisions every day about spending, staff, volunteers, fundraising, organizational structure, leader development, staff and volunteer education, debt, facility management, marketing, media, and online presence. Yet, despite all of that, it is rather amazing how little most church leaders know about business, finance, real estate, administration, or management. Many mainly rural and small churches are closing daily because they can no longer manage their own existence. Attendance and giving might be dwindling; the churches may no longer be able to pay for a

November 2, 2019

Jerry Harris

Sacred Responsibility, Sacred Trust

By Jerry Harris I have many fond childhood memories of Christmas. I remember the silver tree we set up in our front picture window. We shined a filtered light on it that changed its color to red, green, blue, and yellow. My older brother would attempt to hypnotize me by setting me in front of it. I remember getting a Close’n Play record player one Christmas that didn’t survive the day. I remember sneaking up behind my deaf uncle, who had fallen asleep in my dad’s chair; we made a huge racket, convinced he was faking not being able to

October 18, 2019

Jerry Harris

A ‘Singular’ Mission

By Jerry Harris Some might argue it’s a fine point to draw a line between the “n” and the “s” in the word missions, but I have always felt it there. Having graduated from a Bible college that emphasized the need of going “to the uttermost part of the earth,” I felt my commitment to Christ was measured by the space between where I started and where I went. There were mission requirements for my degree, and I remember asking the head of the missions department whether he valued foreign mission work over domestic ministry. I chose a domestic path

August 22, 2019

Jerry Harris

New Leases on Life in Rural Churches

By Jerry Harris I love rural churches and communities; I have devoted virtually my entire ministry life to them. The bulk of Restoration Movement churches have been rural over our more than 200-year history. The church I serve operates in 11 rural and micropolitan communities, but the stories of two of them—Lima and Mount Sterling, Illinois—can provide hope for many others across the country. The Federated Church of Lima, located in a town of 125 about a half hour north of Quincy, Illinois, was the beneficiary of a literal windfall. After a tornado struck the church on May 10, 2003,

July 22, 2019

Jerry Harris

Righting the Wrongs of the Past

By Jerry Harris I’m a product of the suburbs. I grew up on the west side of Indianapolis in the early 1960s, part of a post-World War II migration from urban areas to planned neighborhoods that sprang up from what were formerly farm fields surrounding big cities. There were a number of reasons for this great migration. Ex-servicemen had access to loans to pursue the American dream, so they moved out of apartments in the city and purchased their own homes on their own land in burgeoning suburbs. The availability of automobiles and creation of the interstate highway system encouraged

June 22, 2019

Jerry Harris

Considering Robert Coleman

By Jerry Harris Some people we cross paths with in life leave an indelible mark. Robert Coleman is such a person for me. A few years ago, I was part of a group of leaders who were preparing the speaking lineup for that year’s Exponential conference. The focus that year was on discipleship and its relationship to church planting. Jim Putman, a preacher whose life and ministry have been devoted to relational discipleship, was chosen as a featured speaker and also selected to help write that year’s accompanying book. He and Bobby Harrington were looking for a third person to

May 22, 2019

Jerry Harris

When We Go to War in Our Movement

By Jerry Harris This past April, my wife and I had the opportunity to preach and teach at Hope Christian Church near Augusta, West Virginia. Like most, I am now fully dependent on a GPS to direct my driving in unfamiliar places, so when I heard Siri say we could save 18 minutes by taking an alternative route around an accident, I jumped at the chance. The new path took us through switchback mountain roads—not a pleasurable experience for my wife, who struggles a bit with car sickness. The detour took us right by Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, a very

April 24, 2019

Jerry Harris

What Do Attendance Numbers Represent?

By Jerry Harris More than a year ago, I wrote a publisher’s column called “The Tyranny of Numbers.” As a senior pastor, when I review reports of numbers representing baptisms and budgets, and especially attendance, it has a great personal effect on me. Affirming words are a primary love language for many pastors, and since attendance, on its surface, seems to be a measure of affirmation, numbers that represent attendance feel like a metric of worth. I think that’s one reason some pastors choose not to report their church’s attendance and baptism numbers (along with other statistics) for annual surveys

April 19, 2019

Jerry Harris

How the Mighty Pastors and Preachers Fall

By Jerry Harris The announcement came in mid-January. James MacDonald, founding pastor of Harvest Bible Chapel, based in the Chicago area, was taking an immediate and indefinite sabbatical from all preaching and leadership in his ministry. The elders took this action in response to mounting criticism concerning leadership overreach, financial questions, and alleged abuse of staff and members over a 12-year period.  Stories of this sort are becoming all-too-common among megachurch pastors . . . and they show no sign of slowing. The churches that provide platforms for these leaders represent tens of thousands of people. High-visibility, powerful-personality pastors and

February 25, 2019

Jerry Harris

Our Move to Not-for-Profit

By Jerry Harris It happened quietly in 2018. The owner of Christian Standard and The Lookout took on not-for-profit status for the first time ever. For about 150 years, the magazines were guided by Standard Publishing, which did business like most of the working world . . . as a for-profit. The company encouraged churches to buy and pass out their magazines for free and to purchase their books and other helps for teaching. That system endured for years, even as the business was bought and sold four times. Then, in early 2017, a church-centric organization purchased the magazines, and

January 3, 2019

Jerry Harris

Heroes

By Jerry Harris   What are heroes? Heroes are people who stand up against insurmountable odds with little or no hope of success. They are people who refuse to give up, even when it’s contrary to the warnings of friends, loved ones, and common sense. They are people who don’t think about how they’ll be remembered, but take action in the moment because they feel the rightness of a cause . . . and the necessity of it. They risk it all for that one chance, that impossible opportunity to make the difference. They are selfless in that moment of

October 21, 2018

Jerry Harris

An Enduring Faith

By Jerry Harris I’ve been praying. I’m writing this on Labor Day weekend—our submissions to the magazine are made well in advance of the printing and posting dates—and recently I’ve been praying for Babs Johnson, hospitalized and in a coma after a serious brain aneurysm a couple of weeks ago. I’ve gotten to know Babs through her husband, Russell, a man with a seemingly inexhaustible supply of goodwill and incredible passion for the church. I asked Russell to write an article about his grandfather, iconic missionary J. Russell Morse—his namesake—for this issue, and he was happy to do so. He

September 30, 2018

Jerry Harris

Thank-You!

(This is a sidebar to Jerry Harris’s October 2018 Letter from the Publisher: “The NACC: Celebrating Our Wins . . . and Starting an Inspiring New Season”)   By Jerry Harris Seventy-seven names. As one scans them, a history of the modern independent Christian church forms. These men strove to hold together in unity an independent movement while, at the same time, cherishing its individuality. They worked hard to inspire a movement of healthy, growing churches. They had their own ministries, but they generously gave their time, talent, and treasure to advance a tribe and cause in which they believed.

July 27, 2018

Jerry Harris

Youth Ministry 180

By Jerry Harris I remember the way youth ministry used to be. (Yes, I’m one of those guys.) It was a time when adults wanted to create a space for young people so they wouldn’t be bored in the adult service. Back then, church services didn’t connect to students. The deacons, wearing suits and ties, marched in and sat in the front row while the preacher took his place behind the pulpit. The organ would drone an instrumental call to worship until the song leader instructed the congregation to stand, then he would beat out 3/4 or 4/4 time with

June 21, 2018

Jerry Harris

Is the Independent Christian Church Taking Ground?

By Jerry Harris Is the independent Christian church taking ground? That depends on how you measure it. One could measure it by the weekly attendance of affiliated churches, because numerical growth is probably the most common measurement of “taking ground.” By this type of measurement, independent Christian churches are advancing like never before. Our churches fill the lists of Outreach magazine’s largest and fastest-growing churches. Kent Fillinger’s study in our May issue (“Special Church Report Part 1: Megachurches and Emerging Megachurches”) indicates we are building, baptizing, and boldly dreaming like never before. Our mission efforts are also gaining ground as we

Help Keep Christian Standard Free & Accessible with a Tax Deductible Donation

We can do more together!

Every gift makes a difference!

No, thank you.
100% secure transactions - receipts provided.
Does Your Church Want to Support Christian Standard?

Would your church consider including support for Christian Standard in its annual missions budget? Your support would help us not only continue the 160-year legacy of this unifying ministry, but also expand the free resources, cooperative opportunities, and practical guidance we provide to strengthen churches in the U.S. and around the world.

We can do more together!

Every gift makes a difference!

No, thank you.
100% secure transactions - receipts provided.
Secret Link